Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26

www.elsevier.com/locate/jhydrol

Estimation of hydraulic parameters of shaly sandstone aquifers

from geoelectrical measurements
O.A.L. de Lima a,*, Sri Niwas b
a
Center for Research in Geophysics and Geology (CPGG)-Federal University of Bahia, Campus Universitário da Federação,
Salvador, Bahia 40170-290, Brazil
b
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Roorkee, Roorkee 247 667, India
Received 5 October 1999; revised 7 March 2000; accepted 6 April 2000

Abstract
Electrical and hydraulic conductivities of shaly sandstones are described using a capillary approach for a granular, clay
bearing material. The clays are assumed to occur as shale shells uniformly coating the insulated sand grains. The real and
imaginary components of the complex electrical conductivity for this material model are written in terms of a unique solid
matrix conductivity, treated as a volumetric property. Above a critical salt concentration the conductive contribution of the
shells is independent of the electrolyte salinity. Under this condition the equation for the bulk conductivity of the sandstone can
be expressed in a simplified form. However, below the critical concentration the matrix conductivity is dependent on the
conductivity of the water saturating the shaly component and can be expressed only by the complete equation. The hydraulic
conductivity for this model is expressed by a modified Kozeny–Carman equation. A new semi-empirical equation relates the
hydraulic conductivity for such rocks, to their porosity, formation resistivity factor and the electrical conductivity of its solid
matrix. These combined properties are described as the lithoporosity factor. In this new formulation the petrophysical para-
meters involved are easily determined from the electrical geophysical measurements. The performance of this equation is firmly
tested with experimental laboratory data available in the literature. Its application is then extended to estimate the hydraulic
parameters of a shaly sandstone aquifer in Bahia-Brazil, using either the borehole or the surface geoelectrical data. Examples
are given to emphasize the combined use of electrical resistivity and induced polarization measurements in computing
hydraulic properties. 䉷 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Permeability; Electrical conductivity; Induced polarization; Shaly sand-stones; Geophysical logging

1. Introduction aquifer behavior one needs to solve a set of differen-

The knowledge of the spatial distribution of
hydraulic parameters of a groundwater flow domain
is essential both for optimizing aquifer exploration
programs as well as to evaluate the efficiency of
contaminant remediation processes. To model the
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: olivar@cpgg.ufba.br (O.A.L. de Lima),
srsnpfes@rurkiu.ernet.in (Sri Niwas).
0022-1694/00/$ - see front matter 䉷 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S0022-169 4(00)00256-0
tial equations under appropriate boundary conditions.
In the absence of exact solution of these equations,
numerical solutions are sought by subdividing the
aquifer in many blocks of elementary dimensions.
For heterogeneous aquifers the procedure of assigning
the hydraulic parameters of each element is not
obvious.
Analysis of pump test data as a function of time are
classical procedures for estimating aquifer para-
meters. These results suffer from non-uniqueness
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
and because of physical and conceptual constraints
underlying such tests, the interpreted results represent
macroscopic averages taken over large volumes of the
porous medium. Small-scale textural and structural
variabilities are lost in this process and these details
may be necessary to solve the hydrological problem
efficiently.
Geophysical measurements made within wells or at
Earth’s surface sample small formation volumes, typi-
cally within a decimetric to a decametric scale. The
physical conditions (tortuosity and porosity) control-
ling the electric current flow (electrical resistivity)
also likewise control the lateral flow of the water
(hydraulic conductivity) in porous media. Exploiting
this similarity, a large number of empirical equations
has been developed to convert the geophysical
measurements into hydraulic parameters (Kelly,
1977; Kosinski and Kelly, 1981; Scott, 1988; Sen et
al., 1990; Börner et al., 1996; Sighal et al., 1998;
Yadav and Abolfazli, 1998). Sri Niwas and Singhal
(1981, 1985) have developed an analytical relation-
ship between the hydraulic conductivity and electrical
resistivity through the well-established laws of
physics, i.e. Darcy’s law of lateral flow of ground
water and Ohm’s law of current flow in clean porous
media. These results provide a physical and mathema-
tical basis to the statistically established relations.
For clean sandstones, a porous model of free rugose
channels leads to a fractal representation for its poros-
ity, specific surface, hydraulic and electrical tortuos-
ities as well as to its formation resistivity factor (Katz
and Thompson, 1985; Korvin, 1992; Turcotte, 1992).
In this model the grain size distribution is such that
most of the void space is hydraulically interconnected
and almost the whole interstitial fluid is free to flow
under an applied piezometric head. This inter-
connected porosity may be referred to as an effective
hydraulic porosity (f e). The mean geometrical tortu-
osity of the channels can be distinguished as a free
pore tortuosity having similar effects on both the elec-
trical and hydraulic flows through the medium. For
such rocks analytical and experimental evidence
support a relationship between the electrical and
hydraulic conductivities obtained from Archie’s and
Kozeny–Carman’s equations in the following form
(Croft, 1971; Kelly, 1977)
k ˆ aF ⫺q ; …1†
13
where a and q are empirical constants and F, the
formation resistivity factor, is given as F ˆ s w =s 0 ;
with s 0 and s w being the conductivities of the fully
saturated whole rock and of its pore electrolyte,
respectively. The constant a in Eq. (1) is inversely
proportional to the square of the specific surface for
the sandstone, and so has a dimension of L 2.
It is worthwhile to recall here that Heigold et al.
(1980) have combined Darcy’s equation and Archie’s
relation (Archie (1950)) between permeability and
porosity of rocks to obtain the following equation
similar to Eq. (1) as
k ˆ a 1 fb1 ; …2†
where k is the intrinsic permeability (m 2)—the pore
area of the rock governing the flow, f is porosity and
a1 and b1 are constants. However, the hydrophysical
property is the hydraulic conductivity, K (m/s)—fluid
velocity, which depends on both the formation and the
fluid contained in it. Notwithstanding, our effort
should be to obtain a more physically supported
quantitative relation instead of an empirical one.
Nuttings’ equation (Hubbert, 1940) relates k and K
as
rg
Kˆk ; …3†
m
where m is the dynamic viscosity of the fluid (kg/ms),
r the fluid density (kg/m 3) and g the acceleration due
to gravity (m/s 2). For hydrological problems the fluid
is water and ideally m and r can be taken as unit. Thus
the permeability value can be converted approxi-
mately to hydraulic conductivity by multiplying by 10.
In shaly sandstones, however, there are two main
grainsize populations, one characterizing the sand
fraction and another the shaly portion. This generates
two porosity parameters: one effective hydraulic
porosity, as for the clean sandstone, and a shale poros-
ity whose pores are normally filled with bound water.
In the same way, we can distinguish two tortuosity
indices: one for the free water channels and another
for the bound water conduits. The first controls a large
fraction of the electrical flow and the whole of the
hydraulic transport through the medium. However,
the second one, contributes only to the electrical trans-
port inside the shaly coatings. These two electrical
paths act essentially in a parallel association (de
Lima and Sharma, 1990). Pure shales represent the
14 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26

10 00 .0 10 00 .0

10 0.0 10 0.0
In trinsic P erm ea bility (m d )

In trinsic P erm ea bility (m d )

10 .0 1 0.0

1 .0 1.0

0.1 0.1
1.0 10 .0 1 00 .0 10 00 .0 0 .1 1.0 10 .0 10 0.0
R ea l P art o f C o nd uc tiv ity (X 0 .0 1 S /m ) Im a gina ry P art o f C o nd uctiv ity (X 10 -4 S /m )

Fig. 1. Relationship between intrinsic permeability and real and imaginary component of the electrical conductivities at 0.5 M NaCl electrolyte
salinity for typical shaly sandstones (data from Vinegar and Waxman (1984), 1984).

limits when fe ! 0; when one still has effective elec-  and the particular type of clay (b 1 is the charge
…rs ; a†
trical conduction but the medium may be almost density on a clay particle) and Qv is the clay compen-
impervious to water flows. sating ionic charge per unit pore volume of the
For shaly sandstone there is no straightforward sandstone (de Lima, 1995).
relationship between electrical and hydraulic conduc- Existing hydrophysical models have not used the
tivities. In Fig. 1 we plot the intrinsic permeability surface conduction effects and differences in tortuos-
data of Vinegar and Waxman (1984) for typical ities to estimate the total surface area contributed by
shaly sandstones, against their corresponding real shale/clay in an aquifer. At the same time results using
and imaginary electrical conductivity components. relations developed for clean formations remain ques-
From this figure we observe no obvious correlation tionable for use in shaly formations. This situation
between electrical and hydraulic parameters. requires that we widen the canvas by including
de Lima (1995), using a capillary approach for a other geoelectrical data in addition to resistivity
granular shaly coated model, has derived a semi- measurements to redeem this hopeless situation.
empirical equation relating the intrinsic permeability In the present work we review the petrophysical
of a porous medium to its porosity, formation factor basis for relating electrical and hydraulic parameters
and clay content as follows: of a granular material having dispersed charged parti-
" #q cles in its solid matrix. By reworking and expanding
fe F ⫺1 previous results for self-similar clay-coated models
k ˆ a0 ; …4†
1 ⫹ dQv described by de Lima and Sharma (1990, 1992) and
de Lima (1995) we developed a new permeability
where a 0 and q are also empirical constants, f e and F equation totally dependent on petrophysical para-
are the effective porosity and true formation factor of meters easily determined either from the surface elec-
the sandstone, d…ˆ rs =3ab1 † is a parameter controlled trical or well log measurements. For borehole logging
by the average sizes of the sand and clay particles the electrical resistivities measured with different
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
Fig. 2. Sketch of a self-similar granular shaly sandstone model and
one of its representative channel.
depths of investigation are required to find the neces-
sary parameters. From surface electrical measure-
ments the dc-resistivity and an induced polarization
parameter are used for the conversion. Although the
IP phenomenon has been suggested to correlate with
the aquifer permeability (Bodmer et al., 1968; Ogilvy
and Kuzmina, 1972; Worthington and Collar, 1984;
Börner et al., 1996; Weller and Börner, 1996), to our
knowledge, this is the first report describing a firmly
supported quantitative use of IP and resistivity for an
aquifer evaluation.
2. The shaly sand model
The electrical, hydraulic and other transport proper-
ties of shaly sandstones are strongly controlled by the
geometrical arrangement of their grains, by the inter-
facial processes occurring at boundaries between
water and clay particles, as well as by the saturation
level and the salinity of the interstitial water.
To simulate the physical behavior of shaly sand-
stones we assume a self-similar porous model of
spheroidal particles composed of ns insulating sand
grains of distributed sizes rs,i, and ni clay particles
also of distributed sizes ai and arranged essentially
as thin uniform coating structures around the sand
grains. The clays are electrically charged particles
that are compensated by exchangeable cations.
Under a water wet condition these ions form diffuse
atmospheres around the clays. Fig. 2 is a schematic
15
representation of this granular model outlining one
typical porous channel. Such a channel is character-
ized by wide pore bodies sequentially interconnected
through narrow pore throats.
The coating shaly structure also alters the effective
porosity and the electrical and hydraulic tortuosities
within the representative channel. An increase in the
clay proportion tends to reduce the effective free pore
diameter and to increase the electrical tortuosity of the
bound water conduits around the pore walls. These
will also introduce important effects on the hydraulic
conductivity of this porous medium. In the following
sections we will describe the basic electrical and
hydraulic characteristics of this granular shaly coated
sandstone.
2.1. The electric effects
The electrical conductivity changes introduced by
clays have been described by several authors
(Vacquier et al., 1957; Marshall and Madden, 1959;
Vinegar and Waxman, 1984; de Lima and Sharma,
1990). The main enhancement is caused by the local
ionic concentration gradients developed by membrane
filtration effects along constrictions on their pore
channels.
Two characteristic lengths are distinguished in the
assumed granular model (Fig. 2): a free pore length at
the grain-size scale and a pore throat constriction of
smaller dimension. An external electrical field will
induce differentiated ionic fluxes inside this channel
that, along the constrictions, are opposed by the catio-
nic selectivity of the clays. These filtration effects will
change the local ionic distribution along the pore
channel. An ionic depletion is induced at the positive
side of a constriction whereas a corresponding
concentration is developed on its negative side.
These charge accumulations make the electrical
conductivity of such sandstones frequency dependent,
described by a total complex current conductivity
function (Dias, 1972; Klein and Sill, 1982; de Lima
and Sharma, 1992). These are the main cause of the
induced polarization effects observed in shaly sand-
stones (Vacquier et al., 1957; Marshall and Madden,
1959).
Next, we will assume that for low frequency
ranges (such that s ⴱ q veⴱ ) the complex electri-
cal conductivity of a shaly sandstone is given by a
16 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26

Bruggeman–Hanay type equation in the form (1992)

ⴱ
!m
2p
ⴱ m 1 ⫺ s cs =s w s csⴱ ˆ sⴱ ; …9†
s 0 ˆ s w fe ⴱ ; …5† 3 ⫺ p sh
1 ⫺ s cs =s 0ⴱ
ⴱ
where s sh is the complex conductivity of a shaly shell
where f e is the effective medium porosity and m and p is the clay volume fraction in the sandstone
a non-dimensional parameter that depends on the matrix. For spheroidal shaly coated particles we
average aspect ratio of the coated sand grains; s 0ⴱ may use Fricke’s result (Fricke, 1924) given as
ⴱ
and s cs are the complex conductivities of the
sandstone and of the clay-coated sand grains, wp
s cs ˆ s ; …10†
and s w the real conductivity of the electrolyte w ⫹ 1 ⫺ p sh
(de Lima and Sharma, 1992).
For low frequency ranges and for a dominant elec- where w is a shape factor. For small values of p …p ⬍
trical conduction through the porous electrolyte 0:3† Eqs. (9) or (10) allows to write
…s w q 兩s cs 兩† a binomial expansion on both the s cs;R ˆ gps sh;R ; …11†
numerator and denominator of Eq. (5) and retention
of only first order terms gives where g is also a geometrical constant ranging from
0.5 to 1. In cases where clays occurs as discrete parti-
1
s 0ⴱ ˆ ⴱ
‰s ⫹ m…F ⫺ 1†s cs Š; …6† cles dispersed through the sandstone matrix, de Lima
F w and Sharma (1990) also found that s cs ˆ ps sh : Thus,
where F is the usual Archie’s formation factor …F ˆ we have good support for using Eq. (11) to express p
f⫺m
e †: Eqs. (5) and (6), with appropriate substitutions,
in terms of the ratio between the effective grain
can also be applied to compacted clays and pure conductivity and the conductivity of its shaly coating.
shales. In this case, s 0ⴱ will represent s sh
ⴱ ⴱ
and s cs Further, for low porosity clays or shales and at low
will be replaced by the complex conductivity of frequency measurements, the following approxima-
wetted clay particles s cⴱ : tions hold (de Lima and Sharma, 1992)
The clay or the coated-clay conductivity will, in d1 …1 ⫹ d1 A†
general, be dependent on the conductivity of its inter- s sh;R ˆ s w; …12†
…1 ⫹ d1 A†2 ⫹ d21 B2
stitial electrolyte. However, as the effective porosity
of clay aggregates and shales is very small, the and
conductivity of their bond waters soon assume a
constant value independent of the water salinity of d21 B sw
the free pore electrolyte (Clavier et al., 1997). s sh;I ˆ ; …13†
…1 ⫹ d1 A†2 ⫹ d21 B2 v
Eq. (6) includes the following components:
where d1 ˆ b1 =aC1 ; b1 being the surface counterion
1
s 0;R ˆ ‰s w ⫹ m…F ⫺ 1†s cs;R Š; …7† density around a clay particle of radius a, and C1 is the
F cationic concentration in the electrolyte where the
coated spheres are immersed; A and B are parameters
and
dependent on frequency and the relaxation time of the
s 0;I ˆ m…1 ⫺ 1=F†s cs;I ; …8† charged clays. From Eqs. (12) and (13) we can write
d1 B
where the subscripts R and I stands for real and s sh;I ˆ s : …14†
v…1 ⫹ d1 A† sh;R
imaginary components of the complex conductivity
function. Combining Eqs. (14) and (9) we get
For a clay-coated spherical particle representative
of a shaly sandstone, and under the same low d1 B
s cs;I ˆ s : …15†
frequency range, we have from de Lima and Sharma v…1 ⫹ d1 A† cs;R
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26 17

5E-4 5E-3
N=0.01 NaCl N=0.1 NaCl
Quadrature Conductivity (S/m)

Quadrature Conducutity (S/m)

2
y=0.01712*x+6.515E-05, r =0.9350
2.5E-4 3E-3

2
y=0.008225*x+4.141E-05, r =0.882

0 0
0 2E-2 4E-2 6E-2 8E-2 0 2E-2 4E-2 6E-2 8E-2
Matrix Conductivity (S/m) Matrix Conductivity (S/m)

Fig. 3. Imaginary component of the bulk conductivity of shaly sandstones versus the real component of its matrix conductivity for 0.01 and
0.1 M NaCl electrolytes (data from Vinegar and Waxman (1984), 1984).

Finally, substituting Eq. (15) in Eq. (8) we have dependent on the frequency and on the clay type in
m…1 ⫺ 1=F†d1 B the sandstone matrix.
s 0;I ˆ s cs;R ˆ lq s cs;R ; …16† Thus, by treating the electrical conductivity of a
v…1 ⫹ d1 A†
shaly sandstone as a complex parameter we derive
where l q is a non-dimensional parameter dependent explicit expressions relating the real and imaginary
on the geometrical features of the porous medium, on components of its bulk conductivity to the real compo-
the clay species present in the shaly shells and on the nent of the conductivity of its solid matrix. Now, we
frequency. have two alternative procedures to find (s cs,R) from
Eq. (16) shows that the imaginary component of the geoelectrical measurements: using Eq. (7) and the real
complex conductivity of a shaly sandstone depends component of conductivity measurements; and using
linearly on the real component of the volumetric Eq. (16) and the imaginary component of conductivity
conductivity of its solid matrix. The constant of measurements or an induced polarization parameter,
proportionality is a geometrical parameter slightly as we will show below.

5E -3 5E -3
N = 0.5 N aC l N = 1.0 N aC l
Im ag in a ry P a rt of C on du ctivity (S /m )

Im ag in a ry P a rt of C on du ctivity (S /m )

y= 0.021 14 *x+ 7.6 57 8E -05 , r 2 = 0.9 22 y= 0.017 34 *x+ 10 .54 E -0 5, r 2 =0 .93 9

2.5E -3 3 E -3

0 0
0 2E -2 4E -2 6 E -2 8E -2 0 2E -2 4E -2 6E -2 8E -2
M atrix C o nd uctiv ity (S /m ) M atrix C o ndu ctivity (S /m )

Fig. 4. Imaginary component of the bulk conductivity of shaly sandstones versus the real component of its matrix conductivity for 0.5 and 1 M
NaCl electrolytes (data from Vinegar and Waxman (1984), 1984).
18 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
In Figs. 3 and 4 we present the best correlation
results between the imaginary component of the
conductivity of shaly sandstones measured by Vine-
gar and Waxman (1984) as a function of their grain
volume conductivity. These were determined from
straight-line fits to their bulk real component measure-
ments made with different water salinities. The figures
show high levels of correlation (r 2 between 0.89 and
0.94) and that l q varies slightly from 0.00822 at
0.01 N to 0.01734 at 1 N. The fittings show very
small intercepts of about 4:1–10:5 × 10 ⫺5 S=m;
attesting the general validity of Eq. (16).
The detection of IP effects in the time domain is
made by measuring both the maximum voltage during
the charging period of a dc-current flow, and the tran-
sient decay of the electrical potential as a function of
time, after the current is turned off. The maximum
voltage is used to compute an apparent resistivity
function (r a). The normalized integration of the
decaying voltage at a specified time window gives
an apparent, time-dependent, chargeability (Ma) for
that window as
1 Zt2
Ma …t† ˆ V dt: …
V0 Dt t1 IP
where Dt ˆ t2 ⫺ t1 is the width of the window and V0
is the maximum voltage observed during the charging
period. With modern instrumentation, the usual
practice is to sample the decaying voltage through a
sequence of windows. In each window a partial appar-
ent chargeability is measured. These values are then
used to compute an weighted average chargeability
for the decaying period.
In the frequency domain both the amplitude and the
phase shift of the apparent impedance of the earth is
measured using different frequencies. A frequency
effect (FE) can be evaluated by comparing the ampli-
tude measurements made at a high alternating
frequency with the one from a much lower frequency
taken as a dc value
兩rⴱ …v1 †兩 ⫺ 兩rⴱ …v2 †兩
FE ˆ ; …18†
兩rⴱ …v2 †兩
with v1 p v2 : An alternative procedure uses the
phase shift measurement made at an intermediate
frequency as (Shuey and Johnson, 1973; Vinegar
and Waxman, 1984)
p
2
FE…v1 ; Av1 † ˆ ⫺ u…v1 A† ln A; …19†
p
with A being the ratio between the two used
frequencies and u ˆ tan⫺1 s 0;I =s 0;R is measured in
milliradians.
As the IP phenomenon is a linear one the time
domain and the frequency domain data are theoreti-
cally related by Fourier transforms. To a first approx-
imation we may use in practice the following result
relating the peak chargeability M(0) to the maximum
FE effect (Zonge et al., 1972)
M…0†
FE ˆ : …20†
1 ⫺ M…0†
2.2. The hydraulic effect
The intrinsic permeability of a porous medium
(dimension L 2) is a measure of its frictional resistance
to a single-phase fluid flowing through it. It depends
on the pore size distribution, on the roughness and
constrictions of pore space and on the tortuosity and
17†
connectivity of their internal pore channels. The most
extensively used approach to simulate the hydraulic
behavior of granular rocks is through the Kozeny–
Carman theory. In this approach, the granular porous
medium is statistically modeled as a spatial array of
capillary channels having different lengths and cross-
sections. Theoretical and experimental results have
attested the practical validity of such approximation
(Wyllie and Spangler, 1952; Terzaghi, 1955; Haring
and Greenkorn, 1970; Scheidegger, 1974; Brace,
1977; Wong et al., 1984; Clennell, 1997).
Following de Lima (1995) we start from the
Kozeny–Carman equation, derived for a porous
medium modeled as a bundle of sinuous capillary
channels, given as
 
VP q
k ˆ afe ; …21†
SA t h
where a is a dimensionless shape factor related to the
statistical average of the channel perimeter to its
cross-sectional area, f e is the effective porosity, SA/
VP is the specific surface area referred to the effective
pore volume, and t h is an average hydraulic tortuosity
for the medium. The constant a for nearly uniform
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26 19

pore size distributions is about 0.5 (Carman, 1956). granular model is

The fractional exponent q in Eq. (21) is required to "n #
Xs X
nc
take into account the fractal nature of the pore space DAs;c ˆ 4p rs;i ⫹
2
ai :
2
…26†
of a real porous rock. iˆ1 iˆ1
From Fig. 2 we assume, as was performed by de
With p given as
Lima (1995), that the hydraulic tortuosity of such a
model can be approximated by the mean electric p ˆ 1 ⫺ DVs =DVcs ;
tortuosity of the free pore channels, given as and
tˆ f…1⫺m†
e : …22† DVc ˆ p…1 ⫺ fsh †DVcs

The conductive contribution due to the shaly shells we may write the following relations:
is described by a different tortuosity referred as the X
ns
3
X
nc

bound-water tortuosity tb ˆ …1 ⫺ fe †=m…1 ⫺ fm rs;i a3i

e † (de
Lima and Sharma, 1992). Eq. (22) has been derived
for clean sandstones, by combining the definitions of
Archie’s formation factor and Carman’s hydraulic
tortuosity (Wyllie and Rose, 1950; Winsauer et al.,
1952). The similarity between hydraulic and electric
tortuosities has been also pointed out by Clennell
(1997) and many others. A similar approach has
been implicitly used by Mualem and Friedman
(1991) and Weerts et al. (1999) for modeling the
bulk soil electrical conductivity of saturated and
unsaturated soils.
The specific surface for the model may be
computed as follows. A representative sample of
volume DV0 of the model contains ns sand grains
and nc clay particles. Two classes of pore space
exist: one, of dimension in the sand-size scale, contri-
butes to the effective porosity, f e; another, within a
clay-size dimension, characterizes the shale porosity,
f sh. If p is the shale volume fraction, the total
porosity, f , for this sample is
f ˆ fe ⫹ pfsh …1 ⫺ fe †: …
The effective void volume in the sample is
fe
DVvcs ˆ DVcs ; …
1 ⫺ fe
where DVcs is the volume fraction occupied by the
shaly coated matrix. For spherical particles
4 fe X ns
DVcs ˆ p r3 : …
3 1 ⫺ fe iˆ1 cs;i
The total solid surface area exposed to fluid in this
X
ns
iˆ1 iˆ1
3
rcs;i ˆ ˆ : …27†
iˆ1
1⫺p p…1 ⫺ fsh †
Using the above relations, the specific surface area
related to the effective pore volume of the sample
(dimension L ⫺1) can be written as
 
S r
Ss;c ˆ A ˆ Ss 1 ⫹ p…1 ⫺ fsh † s ; …28†
VP a
where Ss ˆ 3…1 ⫺ fe †=fe rcs is the specific surface
area of a clean sandstone of the same texture and
porosity, and rcs ; rs and a are the harmonic averages
for the coated sands, the sand cores and the clay sizes,
respectively. Eq. (28) has been obtained on the
assumption of small values of p and f sh such that
products containing the square of these quantities
were neglected. For many shaly sandstones, there is
a direct relation between their matrix electrical
conductivity, the shale proportion and the shale
conductivity, allowing to rewrite Eq. (28) as
Ss;c ˆ Ss …1 ⫹ dc s cs;R †; …29†
23†
where dc ˆ …1 ⫺ fsh †rs =a gs sh depends on the proper-
ties of the clay components and the average size of the
sand fraction.
For montmorillonite and kaolinite gels in distilled
24†
water, experimental data from Cremers and Laudelout
(1966) allow us to find the minimum values for the
electrical conductivity for these compacted wet clays
as s cmont ˆ 0:703 S/m and s ckao ˆ 0:083 S=m (de
Lima and Sharma, 1990). For a critical conductivity
of the electrolyte saturating the shaly shells of
25†
2.5 S/m, a shaly porosity in the range of 20–30%,
and an averaged representative grain size ratio rs =a ˆ
200 we find d c varying from 30 to 150 m/S,
20 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26

1 00 00 0.0

100 00.0
In trin sic P erm e ab ility (m d)

1 00 0.0

q =2 .0

100 .0

q =2 .5
1 0.0

1 .0

M on tm orillon ite
K a o lin ite
0 .1
0 .00 1 0 .0 10 0.10 0 0 .50 0
L ith op oro sity Fa ctor

Fig. 5. Theoretical intrinsic permeability versus the lithoporosity factor for typical shaly sandstone models.

respectively, for montmorillonite and kaolinite size distributions are such that we have two distinct
aggregates or shales. values of d c equal to 50 and 200 m/S. In Fig. 5 we plot
Combining the results expressed by Eqs. (22) and in a log–log scale the modeled permeability values
(29) into Eq. (21) we obtain against a lithoporosity factor for shaly sandstones
" …m⫺1⫹1=q† #q defined as Lfe ˆ fe…m⫺1⫹1=q† =…1 ⫹ dc s cs †: We can see
fe from the figure that the effect of a change in d c is to
k ˆ a0 ; …30†
1 ⫹ dc s cs displace the span of the permeability–lithoporosity
relationship. The exponent q determines the inclina-
where a0 ˆ a=Sqs has a topological dimension L 2, d c is tion of the straight line segments, whereas a 0 defines
a lithologic parameter dependent on the particle size the starting point at s cs ! 0 and fe ! 1:
distributions for sands and clays, and the exponent q is
expected to depend on the coated particle shapes and 2.3. Experimental results
the packing structure of the sandstone. In general, a 0
varies from about 180,000 mm 2 in fine grained …r cs ˆ The permeability Eq. (30) has been tested with
100 mm† to 50,000 mm 2 in medium grained …rcs ˆ experimental core data published by Vinegar and
300 mm† shaly sandstones and q, the space filling Waxman (1984). This data set includes sandstone
fractal dimension, is in the range from 2 to 3. samples representative of different US oil fields. The
To show the effect of changes on the characteristic measurements were made under controlled condi-
parameters of Eq. (30) we constructed Fig. 5. Starting tions, at five different NaCl electrolyte resistivities,
from a clean sandstone of initial effective porosity of covering a range from 0.07 to 8.5 V m. Thus, they
35% we add, in steps, small amounts of clays up to a include both saline and fresh water electrolytes.
maximum p ˆ 20%; ending with a shaly sandstone of Values of s cs and F were determined from linear
fe ˆ 18:75%: Two types of clays are specified by best fitting the real component of their electrical
…1† …2†
s sh ˆ 0:078 S=m and s sh ˆ 0:685 S=m: The grain conductivity measurements. The effective porosity
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
1 00 0
1 00
P erm e ab ility (m d)
10
1
0 .01 0
L ith op oro sity fa cto L
Fig. 6. Relationship between the intrinsic permeability and lithoporosity factor for shaly sandstone (data from Vinegar and Waxman (1984).
f e of each sample has been computed from the F
values using an average m for the data set that
includes only the samples for which the intrinsic
permeability is above 1 md. As the clays in the
samples were described as mixtures of kaolinite, illite
and montmorillonite we estimated d c to be between 50
and 100 m/S. Eq. (30) was fitted to their experimental
data by plotting log(k) versus log…L fe † as shown in
Fig. 6 for dc ˆ 100 m=S: The best fit linear routine
gives a0 ˆ 180; 015 md and q ˆ 2:78 with a regres-
sion coefficient r2 ˆ 0:9054: Two other values for d c
were used with the same data. For dc ˆ 50 we find
a0 ˆ 299; 610 md, q ˆ 3:51 and r2 ˆ 0:9183: For
dc ˆ 200 m=S we obtain a0 ˆ 181; 920 md, q ˆ
2:35 and r 2 ˆ 0:8895: From these results we find the
data can be satisfactorily described by assuming
dc ˆ 100:
Although the adjusted parameters are naturally not
universal, they may be taken as characteristics for a
wide class of shaly sandstones. If so, they can be used
for initial estimates of the order of magnitude of the
intrinsic permeability of shaly formations. In this way,
the determined parameters were applied in this work
as first approximations to estimate the intrinsic
21
0 .10 0 1 .0 00
e
permeability of the São Sebastião aquifer using well
log and surface electrical geophysical measurements.
The São Sebastião Formation is one of the most
important aquifer in the Recôncavo Basin, Bahia—
Brazil. It is composed of thick shaly sandstones
having interlayered shales and siltstones. The sand-
stones were formed as stacked channel and bar depos-
its of a large braided alluvial environment. The shales
and siltstones are lacustrine deposits related to rapid
flooding episodes within a tectonically active intra-
continental basin (de Lima, 1993). Fig. 7 shows the
statistical distribution of porosities and permeabilities
measured on 53 sandstones samples selected from
drill cores of a deep well drilled to a depth of
1025 m. The measured porosities range from 18.8 to
34.9%, with a median of 25.7%. Their permeabilities
cover a wide spectrum having a bimodal logarithmic
distribution ranging from less than 100 to 2750 md,
with a median of 794 md.
Fig. 8 shows the geophysical log of a water produc-
tion well drilled in the São Sebastião Formation in
Recôncavo Basin, Bahia, Brazil. The log suite
consists of: (i) the deep induction and the short normal
resistivity curves responding to both the virgin
22 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
Fig. 7. Frequency distribution of porosity and permeability for shaly
sandstones of the São Sebastião Formation.
conditions and the mud filtrate invaded zone in the
reservoir rock; (ii) the self-potential log and the
natural gamma ray curve; and (iii) the sonic log
converted to a total porosity curve. The resisitivity
of the groundwater was measured directly on samples
…rw ˆ 70 V m†; whereas that of the mud filtrate was
estimated from the mud resistivity and from the SP
deflection …r mf ˆ 30:3 V m†:
Both s cs and F were determined using Eq. (7)
written for the flushed and the virgin conditions,
respectively. The clay volume fraction p was
computed from Eq. (9) with s sh ˆ 0:085 S=m a
value close to that of a kaolinitic aggregate. The
computed p is in good agreement with Vcl estimated
from the gamma ray log using a conventional empiri-
cal equation (Asquith, 1990). Effective porosities
were derived from the formation resistivity factor
using an average m equal to 1.83 (Börner et al.,
1993). The sonic porosities are too high as compared
to f e, suggesting the sandstones are weakly
Fig. 8. Porosity, clay content and intrinsic permeability estimated
from well log measurements on a water well drilled in Bahia, Brazil.
compacted and the sonic data requires corrections
before the application of Wyllie formula (Jorden and
Campbell, 1986). Permeability values were computed
with Eq. (30) using a 0 and q as determined for the
sandstone samples (Vinegar and Waxman, 1984). In
general, the computed k are in a range from 100 to
2200 md with the more frequent values laying
between 1000 and 2000 md. This range compares
favorably with core measurements on true sandstone
samples as described above.
In Fig. 9 we show a time-domain Schlumberger IP-
resistivity sounding made over the São Sebastião
Formation using a SYSCAL R2 resistivity-meter.
The apparent resistivity data were inverted using a
non-linear least square procedure based on horizon-
tally layered earth model (Koefoed, 1979). As shown
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26 23

Fig. 9. Geoelectrical sounding data used in the petrophysical interpretation of shaly sandstone aquifer in Bahia, Brazil.

on the upper part of the figure the experimental data two next layers with resistivities of 730 and
has been satisfactorily fitted to a five layers earth 1320 V m. Below 116 m the aquifer is underlain by
model. The two upper layers are in the top soil a sequence dominated by shales (20 V m).
above the water table. The main aquifer includes the Simultaneously, partial apparent chargeabilities
24 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
were measured at four IP windows centered at 120,
220, 420 and 820 ms, as depicted in the bottom of
Fig. 9. These data sets were interpreted using the
quasi-linear geoelectrical approximation developed
by Patella (1973). In his work Patella introduced a
ficticious apparent resistivity …r 0a † for the Schlumberger
array expressed as
r 0a ˆ Ma ra ; …31†
where r a is the usual apparent resistivity function. The
analytic expression he found for r 0a is formally
equivalent to that of the conventional r a. Thus,
because r 0i ˆ Mi ri ; we can use the same iterative
procedure for inversion of r a to invert the apparent
chargeability data.
The model geometry was fixed according to the
apparent resistivity interpretation, and the inversion
scheme was applied to find the partial Mi’s for the
different layers. The best-fit chargeability models
are shown on the right bottom of Fig. 9. Then, these
partial values were used to obtain a close estimate for
the intrinsic chargeability of the layers.
For each layer the partial chargeabilities were
approximately described by an exponential function
M…t† ˆ M0 exp…⫺t=t†; where M0 can be taken as the
peak chargeability and t as an average relaxation time
for the induced polarization in the layer. By this way
we find for the two aquifer layers M0 …3† ˆ 8:7 mV=V
and M0 …4† ˆ 5:4 mV=V: These results were converted
to FE’s and then to phase shifts using Eqs. (20) and
(19), the latter written assuming a 100 times
frequency variation. The true bulk resistivities and
the u values of the layers allows to find their s 0,I’s.
From Eq. (16) we found the s cs,R’s using l q ˆ
0:0061; a value extrapolated from the data of Figs. 3
and 4, for a NaCl electrolyte of 0.001 M salinity
…rw ˆ 70 V m†: Finally using Eq. (30) together with
the following petrophysical parameters for the
sandstones f e ˆ 25%; m ˆ 1:83; dc ˆ 100 m=S; and
a0 ˆ 180; 015 md and q ˆ 2:78; as found for the
Vinegar and Waxman data, we obtain k3 ˆ 1500 md
and k4 ˆ 1750 md for the permeabilities of these two
sandstone bodies.
3. Conclusions
We briefly review and expand the theory proposed
by de Lima and Sharma (1990, 1992) to describe the
electrical properties of shaly sandstones. We have
shown both theoretically and with experimental
data that the electrical resistivity and the induced
polarization parameters carry direct information
about the volume conductivity of the sandstone
matrix. Thus, the well log measurements obtained
with tools having different depths of investigation,
as well as surface IP-resistivity measurements can
be used to find F, s cs and p for shaly sandstone
formations. Practical application of these procedures
shows good agreement with estimates based on
different approaches and with experimental measure-
ments on samples.
We have also developed a new procedure for
predicting the permeability of sandstones based on
petrophysical parameter readily extractable from elec-
trical logs and surface geoelectrical measurements.
We derive a Kozeny–Carman type equation from
first principles, showing the remarkable influence of
a lithoporosity factor—the combination of a geome-
trical porosity–tortuosity term, with a length pore
scale, clay type and volume content in the sandstone
matrix, as expressed by the factor d cs cs. In this treat-
ment the hydraulic tortuosity is determined as the
average electrical tortuosity along the free pore
electrolyte. The equation was firmly tested with
experimental data measured on different shaly sand-
stone samples published by Vinegar and Waxman
(1984). Next, it was applied as a first approximation
to estimate sandstone permeabilities from electrical
logs and surface geoelectrical sounding measure-
ments. The inferred values compare consistently
with the sample measurements. These estimated
values of permability can easily be converted to that
of hydraulic conductivity to be used for groundwater
management.
Acknowledgements
We wish to thank the Brazilian agencies Finan-
ciadora de Estudos e Projetos (FINEP) and the
National Council for Scientific Development
(CNPq) for providing the financial support for
this work. We would like to thank H. Sato and
B. Clennell for the critical revision of this
manuscript.
 O.A.L. de Lima, Sri Niwas / Journal of Hydrology 235 (2000) 12–26
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